# An argument for gay marriage never voiced before **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 5, 2009, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604 "2009-02-05T19:03:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/21 "2009-02-06T01:53:56Z")
> [@Belrix](#): > > I’m a Christian but a supporter of gay marriage because, IMO, marriage to the government should be a tax situation, a two-person corporation, and gender & sex is immaterial to that status. What about the idea that Uncle Cecil proposes: What if two young twenty-something male college roommates decide to be a couple of smartasses and/or want to share health benefits, so they decide to get “married” until the other one can get a job with bennies, at which point they will get “divorced”. Is this acceptable in your view? ---
**Author:** ![DianaG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ab992/32.png) [@DianaG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DianaG)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/22 "2009-02-06T02:17:49Z")
Would it be okay if they were of different genders? Because that happens more often than you’d think. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/23 "2009-02-06T02:39:27Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > What about the idea that Uncle Cecil proposes: What if two young twenty-something male college roommates decide to be a couple of smartasses and/or want to share health benefits, so they decide to get “married” until the other one can get a job with bennies, at which point they will get “divorced”. > > Is this acceptable in your view? That is similar to the Boston Legal marriage of Denny and Allan, two straight guys getting married to acquire spousal rights. I was fine with it in that case, but really the issue of marriage without consumation is a whole other ballgame deserving of its own thread. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/24 "2009-02-06T04:45:37Z")
> [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](#): > > True, but what does that actually mean? Its just a cliche to a whole lot of people. > **[Jim Crow laws](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Crow_laws)** > > The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws introduced in the Southern United States in the late 19th and early-to-mid-20th centuries that enforced racial segregation. The origin of the term Jim Crow is obscure, but probably refers to a minstrel show song called "Jump Jim Crow". The last of the Jim Crow laws were generally overturned in 1965 by the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Formal and informal racial segregation policies were present in other areas of the United States as well, even as sev ---
**Author:** ![Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eyebrows_0f_doom/32/3119_2.png) [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/25 "2009-02-06T05:27:07Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > What about the idea that Uncle Cecil proposes: What if two young twenty-something male college roommates decide to be a couple of smartasses and/or want to share health benefits, so they decide to get “married” until the other one can get a job with bennies, at which point they will get “divorced”. > > Is this acceptable in your view? I’m sure that happens now not infrequently between roommates/friends of the opposite gender. How would your scenario be any different? ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/26 "2009-02-06T05:28:24Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > What about the idea that Uncle Cecil proposes: What if two young twenty-something male college roommates decide to be a couple of smartasses and/or want to share health benefits, so they decide to get “married” until the other one can get a job with bennies, at which point they will get “divorced”. Nothing in that scenario requires both partners to be the same sex. > [@Enderw24](#): > > I’m for civil unions for gays and marriages for straight people. > Or marriages for gays and civil unions for straight people. Or both. Whichever. > They’re just words. But words matter. Words have emotional significance, and I think it’s a pretty sad marriage that has no emotion. ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/27 "2009-02-06T05:54:13Z")
Saying civil unions are OK, is like telling Rosa Parks “Why don’t you sit in the back of the bus? After all it gets there the same time as the front.” Saying to make all marriages civil unions is akin to saying, “OK we’ll make the WHITE people sit in the BACK and blacks can ride up front.” It solves nothing of the original argument, it just denies marriage to straights. If we’re gonna deny marriage to gays, you don’t get around it by imposing the same restriction on straights to make it fair. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/28 "2009-02-06T06:04:04Z")
> [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](#): > > I’ll bet a lot of people who saw civil union as the fair alternative, voted for Proposition 8 in California. I’ll take that bet and let you define “a lot” and “fair alternative”.😃 It was pure divisive hate and/or ignorance that caused ever single vote in favor. We have long had civil unions. Since it was the pro-Prop 8 folks who put the vote on the ballot in the first place, if they meant to, say, affirm the status quo, both the language of the bill and the campaign rhetoric would have been quite different. ETA - My county voted 75% in favor, my city more like 85% in favor. Trust me, no one likes the status quo here. A lot of them have secrets though. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/29 "2009-02-06T06:27:00Z")
> [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](#): > > In order to succeed in that endeavor you need to win hearts and minds. Not really. This was already a done deal in CA. It was already as legal for 2 men or two woman to get married here as it is where you live. During the campaign I became friends with the first gay men and women married in the County, and met the first men in the county married in Church. This is not hypothetical, it was done, and temporarily (one can only hope) **rolled back** to the situation you are asking people to move forward to. > [@](#): > > Forget those biggots who don’t even want to see civil union. There is no argument that will persuade them. sure there is. time heals most wounds. All the same arguments were made about interracial marriages only 40 years ago when the same series of Court decisions were made by the same Courts in California. Now, those bigots are either dead, over it, laughed at by their kids and grandkids, or in a tiny minority. This pattern has repeated itself throughout American history (OK, US 🙂 ). See the book “Purchasing Intimacy” for an academic sociological/legal review of how laws and relationships have evolved. Typically the laws take some time to catch up to have relationships are experienced in real life, but they always do. And so they shall here. We voted on this what 6 years ago, and in that time the vote went from 69-31 to 52-48. The Pro vote is strongly aging out of their time on earth, and the youngsters think SSM is fine. No one thinks there is any need to give any quarter to negotiation on the No on 8 side right now. We will see how the Court ruling goes next month (I think it will be fine for the No on 8 side) but even if it goes poorly, time is on our side and another vote will be held soon enough to repeal/replace this one, and there will not ever be another demographic reversal that can overturn it. > [@](#): > > Yet there are a significant number of people ( I believe) on the yes side of Prop 8 who oppose gay marriage given there is the “reasonable” alternative in civil union. They care for equal rights and believe that is the solution. That is just wrong though - in its premise and in its conclusions. it is hate and fear, religion and lwo education, not equal rights that drives that group. > [@](#): > > For many, you might as well call their marriage a civil union. They no longer contemplate their initial emotions regarding the beginnings of entering marriage. I wouldn’t suggest that to any of them. Few of them can grasp the difference between civil and religious marriages. And to them if you called their marriage a civil union, you might as well just call them gay to their face, and be prepared to duck. > [@](#): > > But if it ever comes to lets say a national campaign for a pro gay marriage amendment, the cliche of separate but equal just sounds like rhetoric to these people. There is already a national campaign. California is just on the forefront. Trust me, those most against Prop 8, and their ilk in other states would rather not have civil unions either. Just ignore those folks, they are going away at a rapid pace. > [@](#): > > If they can be shown , reminded about what marriage meant to them when they entered into it, get a sense of what it would have meant initially if their option was civil union instead and what it can mean to gay people who want to experience the joys of initiating into a marriage, then I believe enough minds can be changed. That is how the No on 8 campaign and its TV ads were handled. Very non confrontational, straight couples, not gays. That didn’t go over too well, and took a brunt of the blame for pulling defeat from the jaws of victory. It won’t happen again. > [@](#): > > I envision a TV ad. One gay person pulling out a diamond in front of another gay person at a fancy table and asking " Will you enter civil union with me" > > The scene spoke powerfully to me. I’m hard pressed to think it won’t work on anybody else. Yeah and we can run PSAs regarding civil rights with people in blackface being asked to sit at the back of the bus too. Those days are over, the train has long left the station. Today in California we are starting to see court rulings that put the first dents in the Armor of the Federal laws against SSM. This is coming, it will take time, it took 20 years in the case of interracial marriages, and it is not yet 1 year in this case. Patience my friend, it is on the way. Take it to the bank. ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/30 "2009-02-06T06:30:28Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > What about the idea that Uncle Cecil proposes: What if two young twenty-something male college roommates decide to be a couple of smartasses and/or want to share health benefits, so they decide to get “married” until the other one can get a job with bennies, at which point they will get “divorced”. > > Is this acceptable in your view? How is this different then if two people of opposite genders did the same thing? ---
**Author:** ![Vox\_Imperatoris](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Vox\_Imperatoris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vox_Imperatoris)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/31 "2009-02-06T06:49:43Z")
> [@Markxxx](#): > > It solves nothing of the original argument, it just denies marriage to straights. If we’re gonna deny marriage to gays, you don’t get around it by imposing the same restriction on straights to make it fair. But seeing as most of the controversy is over the fact that marriage is a religious sacrament, the government shouldn’t be involved in it at all, in my opinion. A civil union should just be a contract for two people (or heck, more) to live together with a joint income and special legal conditions. I don’t even see why it needs to be relevant whether they are having sex or not. You should be able to get “married” anytime with anyone or anything, in the Catholic Church or the Church of Satan (or in no church at all), for all I care. That way it is only a bond of commitment between the people that enter into it, on their terms, not the government’s. Valete, Vox Imperatoris ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 9:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/32 "2009-02-06T09:44:54Z")
> [@Glazer](#): > > Make all unions civil unions in the eyes of the state. If any two people want to make that union a marriage then find a chirch to do that. That’s the way it is in other languages and jurisdictions (in Spanish we have “matrimonio,” “matrimonio por lo civil” and “matrimonio por la iglesia”, the first being just “either of the other two”). Change the wording in the civil law so everybody gets civil unions already and stop throwing dictionaries at each other, willya? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/33 "2009-02-06T10:09:49Z")
The argument about roommates pretending to be in a gay marriage is an argument against _all_ marriage and all civil partnerships, not an argument aganst gay marriage. The problem with ‘married,’ ‘wife,’ and so on doesn’t really seem to arise with my friends who have a civil partnership. They use those words if they want to (most do, especially the marriage word) without any seeming fear that people won’t believe what they’re saying. The only people who’d think ‘huh, she’s not really your wife, she’s your civil partner’ are those who wouldn’t accept that they were really married even if the Pope himself conducted the ceremony, because ‘marriage is between a man and a woman.’ I also know an older gay man who said that one reason he was grateful for civil partnerships was that, when his husband died, he was able to refer to himself as a widower, which helped people understand what he was going through. (It would also have meant that he didn’t have to pay inheritance tax on his partner’s bequests, and he would be entitled to the same benefits as straight widows and widowers). So people do use the marriage-related words even for civil partnerships. Seperate but not equal is a good reason to oppose civil partnerships rather than marriage, but not if it delays civil partnerships for a long time, so long as those CPs have the same rights as marriage. Otherwise that older gay man wouldn’t have been able to call himself a widow, my friend who’s CPd to an American wouldn’t have been able to live with her in the UK (which was particularly significant, since the American was later diagnosed with cancer), others would wait for years longer to share medical insurance, adoptions would be more difficult, inheritance is more difficult, etc. etc. I’m not willing to sacrifice all the practical advantages of CP for a small matter of principle. ---
**Author:** ![Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8491ac/32.png) [@Fake\_Tales\_of\_San\_Francisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fake_Tales_of_San_Francisco)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/34 "2009-02-06T12:47:13Z")
> [@Vox\_Imperatoris](#): > > A civil union should just be a contract for two people (or heck, more) to live together with a joint income and special legal conditions. I don’t even see why it needs to be relevant whether they are having sex or not. > You should be able to get “married” anytime with anyone or anything, in the Catholic Church or the Church of Satan (or in no church at all), for all I care. That way it is only a bond of commitment between the people that enter into it, on their terms, not the government’s. That’s exactly the way I see it. Also, I don’t think **Glazer** was saying what **Ludovic** suggested. There’s no need in destroying marriage, just make it irrelevant as far as the government is concerned. Why should a religious ceremony give someone special rights? Shall we introduce tax reductions for all those baptised in water? I mean, it probably means they’ve started tithing, so why not give 'em a break? All unions between two people recognised by law should be these so called ‘civil unions’. And ‘marriages’ should be held in whatever Church/Mosque/Temple/Fourth Example Place Where Marriage May Or May Not Occur you want. And it should be what I think the writers of the Bible originally intended - a statement of commitment. Really, isn’t linking marriage to the government tainting the sanctity of marriage? Why are Christians so ferociously defending this special status? Oh…yeah. Now it makes sense. ---
**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/35 "2009-02-06T14:10:55Z")
The right answer to this is that the government should never endorse ANYTHING but CIVIL UNIONS for ANYONE. Then everyone and anyone is entitled to this secular benefit. Marriages should be for churches. Any church, even the more whacky ones. People can choose their religion (or lack thereof) but it’s really not that simple to choose which government you must live under. This way there is nothing for the religious whack jobs to oppose, no implicit endorsement of lifestyles by the government, equal protections for all. So, the key to Gay Marriage is not to overcome predjudice, it’s to remove something that is inherently a religious rite/ceremony from the government. ---
**Author:** ![Belrix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed655f/32.png) [@Belrix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belrix)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/36 "2009-02-06T17:27:14Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > What about us atheists who want to get married? Are you going to admit to a spiritual bonding between two people? I’m just saying - call it what you will but make it a different thing in the government’s eyes so that marriage is not gender dependent. ---
**Author:** ![Belrix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed655f/32.png) [@Belrix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belrix)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/37 "2009-02-06T17:30:32Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > What about the idea that Uncle Cecil proposes: What if two young twenty-something male college roommates decide to be a couple of smartasses and/or want to share health benefits, so they decide to get “married” until the other one can get a job with bennies, at which point they will get “divorced”. > > Is this acceptable in your view? What’s to prevent it between to different sexed people today? My health benefits can be extended as “partner coverage” to any one person who shares an address to me - no marriage or civil union needed. If they want to get “married” or “civilly-unionized” (man - we gotta work on terminology) and then want to go through all the hassle of getting divorced later, then more power to them. Smart-assed or not - gender isn’t significant to your hypothetical. ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/38 "2009-02-06T17:34:52Z")
Outlaw all marriages. That should send the homerphobes into a right tizzy. ---
**Author:** ![Belrix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed655f/32.png) [@Belrix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belrix)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/39 "2009-02-06T17:35:17Z")
…and as I finish reading to the bottom, I find my points have already been made… ---
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2009, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604/40 "2009-02-06T19:15:06Z")
> [@scifisam2009](#): > > I’m not willing to sacrifice all the practical advantages of CP for a small matter of principle. OK fair enough, but where do you live? That party started so long ago, if you are going to get dressed up now, is that the right one to plan to attend? It might be, or it might not be, depending on where you are. In CA, it is certainly NOT the one to plan to attend anymore. But if you need a gateway party for now (as opposed to waiting until the whole gender restriction thing is found unconstitutional anyway), then sure, it is a good stepping off point. Just don’t let anyone be fooled into thinking it is a final destination. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-argument-for-gay-marriage-never-voiced-before/484604.md?page=3)